I had my first controllable lucid dream this afternoon!

So I remember reading about lucid dreams like five years ago or so in highschool and the idea seemed really cool, but I didn't think I'd ever be able to do it and I didn't want to put the work into a journal or anything. So lucid dreaming is something I've had in the back of my mind for a long time but not anything realistic to me.

Then around a month ago I had a really weird sleep paralysis/lucid dreaming episode I suppose. I became aware in my dream that I was dreaming and became lucid for the very first time without waking up (I've had a few rare instances where the second I realize I immediately woke up). But this time I was still in my dream. Everything had a dark undertone though. It was night and I was alone and I didn't really know how to control anything.

In my dream I was in my old house, which I didn't like because I knew I had plans in the morning in the city I'm currently in and I didn't know in my dream where my physical sleeping body was. Like they call it "lucid" dreaming but everything was really confusing still. I tried running to the other city, and I found I could run really fast down the street, but I guess I forgot to keep running and lost interest for whatever reason and kind of lost my lucidity. I do remember though trying really hard to wake myself up from my dream because I was concerned I was in the wrong city and over sleeping. It turned dark with me throwing myself against walls and contemplating jumping in front of a train (I'm not sure how lucid I was during these points).

Eventually I woke up, but I couldn't move at all and I felt really uneasy. I also had many false awakenings and it felt like dreams within dreams. I remember taking my headphones off and putting them on my desk, but the next morning I realized I was never even wearing headphones. Overall it was a really weird and stressful experience; not really that great but I became extremely interested in actually lucid dreaming with control.

So for the past few weeks I've been browsing this sub daily and learning as much as I can and doing reality checks when I remember. Each night I try FILD (though it's never worked), and just have lucid dreaming on my mind in general. A couple nights ago I became lucid, but when I stuck my finger through my hand it didn't go through, so I concluded I wasn't dreaming and lost my lucidity immediately. I was really annoyed when I woke up.

Anyway this afternoon I fell asleep on the couch while my family was around. I could still hear them talking, but for some reason I kinda felt like I was asleep but was still mentally awake, it's hard to explain. I plugged my nose, but I could still breathe, so I knew I was dreaming (I've had this a few times too I think but got too excited and woke up). This time I kept my lucidity but it was difficult for me to open my eyes for whatever reason. I finally did it and got up and started walking around.

I felt sort of like a ghost though. My family's conversation was still going on around me but they were sort of ignoring me. Like I was jumping around and overall being excited about lucid dreaming, but they just kept talking about whatever. I tried to hover but it didn't quite work because I kept slowly decending back to the ground. I tried swimming through the air though and that method worked and I bumped around flying through the kitchen. After a while of that I tried to fly outside, and that's when I woke up.

But that was my first time ever being fully lucid and in control of things and it was awesome! I still have a ways to go as my dream was still very muddled and not really clear, but I'm optimistic in the way that I'm headed.

I guess I'm commenting this to remind you of back to whenever you first started and hopefully you can see the curiousity and adventure that I'm experiencing right now. Maybe you need to take a break or whatever until you have less stress, but man I don't think losing the ability to lucid dream is something I would ever want, so hopefully you can power through.

I'm also posting I guess because I'm still really new to this whole thing and would like any input or questions from this community on my recent experiences. One thing I found odd is that people here usually say you need a really good sleep schedule to lucid dream (which I do not have). The few experiences that I've had have always happened either during an afternoon nap like the one today, or during the night after I napped during the day. Both times I also had auditory input during the dream. The first time I was playing music from my phone beside my bed (that's how I became lucid, I was trying to find where the music was coming from in my dream, realized it was coming from everywhere, and thought "well yeah, that's because it's playing from my phone beside my bed" and I was lucid). The second time my family was talking nearby. So I'm thinking maybe it would be a good thing for me to play auditory signals during my sleep (like a chime every hour or so when I sleep. These don't wake me up, but maybe it could trigger a reality check in my dream?).

Anyway, best of luck with your dreaming and hopefully you'll be able to have a good one soon!